by Tim Symonds
Holmes waited while I caught up. ‘You ask after Zorka’s goal, Watson - I shall now tell you. Please continue with our letter:
You will have heard that Dr. Watson and I recently visited Titel. We return with a request from Lieserl. So she may face eternity with equanimity the infant wishes to be taken from the pit she’s in and laid to rest in holy ground - ’
My comrade broke off.
‘Where would you suggest, Watson? Under the care of the Archimandrite?’
‘Or Father Florus?’ I suggested, adding mischievously, ‘it’s a trek longer and twice as arduous as the climb to the Reichenbach Falls.’
‘Our Lady Among The Rocks - where else! Good! Excellent! Continue: ‘at the Church of Our Lady Among The Rocks’. Put a map-reference there.’
Holmes stopped to give me an enquiring look.
‘Which flowers shall we command this Einstein to place on his daughter’s grave?’
‘In our long years together, Holmes, you mentioned only one flower, the moss-rose.’ I replied.
‘The moss-rose it is! Write as follows: We are quite certain you will be able to arrange this simple matter. Please ensure personally the grave-site is strewn annually with the moss-rose. It blooms all summer.
Watson, end the letter with: May I congratulate you on the prospective offer of a position in Professor Sobel’s Department. We shall monitor your career with very great interest.
I am,
Very sincerely etc.
S. Holmes.’
At this my companion leapt to his feet.
‘Hats, Baedeker and your Gladstone, Watson! Leave that at the hotel desk for posting. That should do it. The chase is at an end. Einstein will know at once the threat which confronts him. He knows we shall stay silent only if he carries out his side of the bargain. Otherwise the world of science will have a scandal on its hands beyond the Rector’s wildest fears.’
Chapter XIV
The Matter Settled, We Return to Baker Street
We were on our way home. Holmes and I sat across from each other in a swiftly-moving railway carriage, he in his long grey travelling-coat and deerstalker cap, Bradshaw’s Railway Guide at his side, Gladstone bag at mine. Paris had come and gone. Ahead lay Calais. Our concern that agents from Moran’s criminal gang would lie in wait for us at Calais or the white cliffs of Dover had dissipated with the weeks spent in Serbia. Soon we would be greeted by our loyal Mrs. Hudson on that fine street laid out by master builder William Baker, nestled in the splendour and squalor of England’s Capital city, over it all the comforting sound of a bell striking from a distant tower.
My comrade filled a pipe and applied a flame. He looked across at me through the blue fumes.
‘The fair sex is your department, Watson,’ he said reflectively, ‘but women never cease to amaze me. So profound is Mileva’s love for Einstein, unless her own letter was thrust before her on the witness stand, I am certain she would affirm in a Court of Law, even on the Holy Bible, that it was her husband and he alone who formulated the magical equation on which he may now build a considerable career.’
His voice softened. ‘I am satisfied we did what was required of us. If Lieserl is not reburied in hallowed ground, Zorka believes the child will continue to live out her natural term as a rusalka. By obliging young Einstein to go - however secretly - to Titel and arrange the reburial of his daughter in holy ground we may have done him a considerable favour. If the matter had festered in Zorka’s mind much longer, the crime she may have committed against his person can only be left to the mists of conjecture. The infant is beyond our powers of reassurance but it is all men’s wish to see justice done - especially to the dead. Lieserl will rest sheltered by Father Florus and the Hand of God. Once done, the rusalka will fall silent, the haunted house become a simple ruin.’
Holmes looked at me reflectively. ‘They may call Zorka mirna ludakinja as much as they wish but she has a remarkable mind. Her enterprise was brilliantly done. She led everyone to believe her old home was haunted while the matter of Lieserl’s final resting place awaited settlement. She has ensured the reburial of an infant in a quiet and beautiful spot, in sacred ground. As to Mileva, due fame has been withheld from her but there are always those who profoundly despise and fear any women with a mind the equal of men or greater. Had we revealed the truth it may not have benefitted her in her lifetime. The hyenas would be unleashed on her. Her enemies would call her an adventuress, a liar, a cheat, a grande horizontale. At least you and I know the truth, Watson.’
He glanced across at me.
‘Until you choose to publish this adventure we must console ourselves that the secret history of the world is frequently so much more interesting than the public chronicles.’
I asked, ‘How do you suppose Zorka gained possession of those letters?’
‘Given Einstein’s lack of acknowledgement of anyone except himself in the new theories, I suggest he thought he had long since got rid of them. It’s entirely conceivable Zorka found them in his waste-paper basket not long after they were written and squirreled them away for a rainy day.’
‘And that rainy day came.’
‘It did’. His eyes twinkled.
‘Now we can return to Mrs. Hudson’s dinners. As to whether we regale her with fishing tales from the Tisza - ’
I nodded. I pondered another matter, the failure of my commission. How was I to break the news to Sir George Newnes?
Holmes sensed my abstraction.
‘My dear friend, you have not brought up the matter which must surely be very close to your heart, certainly your pocket.’
‘Which is, Holmes?’ I enquired as innocently as I could.
‘The Christmas cover photograph for the Strand.’
‘Ah,’ I responded. ‘That matter! I had quite forgotten.’
He tapped me on the knee. ‘When we get back to London I shall commission John Singer Sargent to paint an Alpine waterfall - one of his six-footers. As soon as you purchase a camera - and if my clothes ever dry - I shall pose for you in front of Mr. Sargent’s backcloth of boiling waters, safe in the heart of the Sussex Downs.’
We continued in this happy vein while our train chugged through the long twilight.
Once more in London, an excited Mrs Hudson greeted us. She handed me a telegram. It was from Colonel Moran. We read it silently.
‘To Messrs. Holmes and Watson. 31st May ’05. Trent Bridge. England’s cricketers under Stanley Jackson beat Australia by 213 runs. Bosanquet’s googlies took 8 Australian wickets for 107 runs, second innings.
I am sending you two tickets for the Lord’s Pavilion on August 2nd.
Sebastian Moran (Col.)’
‘Aha! He’s back!’ Holmes exclaimed. ‘He kept his men at bay in order to challenge us to a duel. The wheel grinds ever onward.’
As I climbed the steep stairway to our rooms Holmes called back, ‘What takes place at Thomas Lord’s on August 2nd, Watson?’
‘The centenary Eton versus Harrow match,’ I replied.
‘We have something to look forward to. Our Colonel will want to redress the humiliation we’ve just inflicted on him, no matter what the cost to his well-being.’
‘Or to his life,’ I added, reaching the landing. I pointed at Holmes’s pocket containing the hip-picket Webley.
‘We shall be ready, Holmes,’ I said confidently. ‘If he dares to tangle with us at Lord’s, even on the Mound, he will quickly find himself on the London Necropolis Line with a one-way ticket to Brookwood Cemetery.’
‘Watson,’ Holmes said, unable to repress a smile, ‘no-one can say you are just a galumphing St. Bernard. There is something of the Kipling in you. May I interest you in a Trichinopoly cheroot?’
‘My dear Holmes, I would rather smoke an Old Bailey judge’s Full Bottom horsehair wig.’
Postscript
In 1907, two years after the publication of the paper, Einstein changed the first formulation L=mV² to E=MC², the most famous equation in physics. Over the next decades the esteem, even reverence, accorded this remarkable scientist, stemming from the Annus Mirabilis of 1905, became unstoppable. Had Holmes revealed his deduction to the world at that time, that this Newton incarnate had fathered an illegitimate child who was then subjected to a mercy-killing, it is no exaggeration to say that rather than ending Einstein’s career before it had begun, Holmes and Watson might themselves have become objects of derision, even of dangerous hatreds.
Holmes’s and Watson’s experience in Serbia was far from wasted. What they learnt in the search for Lieserl was to be of extraordinary value when, hardly a year later, at the behest of a British Prime Minister, Holmes and Watson paid a second visit to Constantinople, the capital of the Ottoman Empire, on a most secret and sensitive mission. The ‘Sick Man of Europe’ was collapsing. Once again the Sword of Osman had gone missing. Was an uprising against the Caliph in the offing? With what consequence for Britain’s interests in the Middle East and India? And what devious part was Mycroft about to play in the proceedings?
Endnotes
Watson’s Army career in India and Afghanistan commenced with a medical degree from the University of London. The college validated credentials earned through hospital study rather than offering medical instruction of its own.
The Cullinan Diamond was named after Sir Thomas Cullinan, the mine-owner. At 3,106-carats, contemporary estimates of its value if cut into a dozen marketable stones were around £150,000, the equal in today’s money of £45 million. The stone was bought by the Transvaal government and presented to King Edward VII on his birthday. The task of transporting the stone to London involved a diversionary tactic worthy of Holmes. The rumour was deliberately spread that the diamond was being transported to England on a steamboat. Detectives crammed aboard. The stone on the ship was a glass replica. The real diamond was sent to England in a plain box via parcel post (albeit registered).
Strand Magazine. Except for the first two Sherlock Holmes novels, all the detective stories had their first UK publication in the Strand, a monthly magazine founded at the beginning of 1891 by Sir George Newnes, the creator (in 1881) of Tit-Bits, the weekly paper of miscellaneous information and entertainment. The Strand was introduced as a more respectable product, with the title taken from the fashionable West End thoroughfare. So, for instance, issues often contained short stories translated from the French or Russian, and it was - for Conan Doyle - a mark of success that his stories were included in this prestigious publication.
The Ghost of Grosvenor Square: by failing to explain this interesting case Watson does himself a disservice. After being shown around the site of a crime, a Mayfair mansion, he deduced the intruder was garrotted by a sightless man who knew the house well. Scotland Yard put out an international arrest order for the mansion’s owner, an American, who had fled the country and was indeed blind.
The Criterion, a famous restaurant located near Piccadilly Circus. Arthur Conan Doyle set a very early meeting (late 1880 or early 1881) between Holmes and Watson in the Criterion Long Bar, later a convenient meeting spot for the Suffragettes.
‘Napoleon Crossing the St. Bernard’: a propaganda painting by Jacque-Louis David depicting Napoleon in his famous crossing of the Alps. In reality Napoleon crossed the Alps on a mule, not a magnificent horse. Mules have better balance and traction, are lower to the ground, and do better in cold weather.
The Prince Regnant of Bulgaria. A central character in Sherlock Holmes and The Case of The Bulgarian Codex where Holmes was commissioned to find a stolen ancient manuscript of very considerable importance.
Hegira. Migration of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and his followers from Mecca to Medina, here used as ‘journey’.
Rara avis. A rare or unique person or thing.
En cas où. ‘just in case’
Redresseur de destins. A rectifier of destinies.
Junior United Service Club: a gentleman’s club in London founded in 1827 and based at 11 Charles Street. Membership was restricted to former or serving officers in the Navy or Army with at least five years active service. Unlike its senior, the United Services Club in Pall Mall, its fees were moderate, which was why it was attractive to Dr Watson.
Doctor Honoris Causa: Honorary Doctorate. These started to be granted by universities across Europe (including Oxford and Cambridge) in the fifteenth century. The ceremony usually includes a eulogistic statement in Latin and/or Greek justifying the grant by the University Orator, opening with the word ‘Whereas’ and the concluding statement with ‘Therefore’. Those granted doctorates ‘honoris causa’ do not usually thereafter term themselves Doctor unless they have a separate academic doctorate. In November 1919, on the celebration of the 500th anniversary of the University of Rostock, Albert Einstein and Max Planck (German physicist and Nobel laureate, 1858-1947) were awarded honorary doctorates, Einstein for Medicine ‘in recognition of the enormous work of his mind’, the only honorary doctorate Einstein was given in Germany. Einstein was granted a doctorate ‘honoris causa’ by Princeton University in 1921 and by Oxford in 1931.
‘Drumming a tattoo on his knee with his fingers’: this tell-tale habit has been used by several authors to give the villain away, for instance, Sir Edmund Appleton in Scottish author John Buchan’s The Thirty-Nine Steps, the first of five novels featuring Richard Hannay. Hannay was an all-action hero with a stiff upper lip and a miraculous knack for getting himself out of sticky situations.
Penang Lawyer. Walking stick having a bulbous head and made of the stem of an East Asiatic palm (Licuala acutifida).
2/8d and 3/6d. Two shillings and eight pence, i.e. two pennies over a half-crown. Some calculations estimate the purchasing power of 2/8d in 1905 as approximately GBP41.74 or US$67.64 in 2013. Three shillings and sixpence - calculations based on the purchasing power of 3/6d suggest its purchasing power would be GBP54.78 or US$88.77.
The double rifle. This Victorian development excels over other repeating firearms by allowing a split-second, secondary shot on large, dangerous game without having to work the firearm’s action. This can be a matter of life or death for the shooter when a large, dangerous animal chooses to charge, especially in close quarters or in thick cover. The double rifle rapidly became the weapon-of-choice of many professional White Hunters in India and especially in Africa, both now and when the author lived in Africa.
Tractarian: members of the Anglican High Church movement were also sometimes known as Tractarians. This High Church link in Watson’s background is not widely known - and here, in prompting a Nonconformist clergyman (let alone Sherlock Holmes) to display Biblical knowledge based on the Old Testament, he was being mischievous. Many Nonconformist ministers had never been to Oxford or Cambridge and were not likely therefore to have the detailed knowledge of the Scriptures in their original formats.
Churchwarden clay pipes: these are characterised by an extremely long stem, up to 20 inches in length.
The Colonial and Continental Church Society. A Protestant missionary society, created by the amalgamation of two early nineteenth century societies in 1851: it specialised in sending out clerically-qualified schoolmasters and catechists to areas such as Catholic Europe and Russia as well as North America - unlike the better-known societies such as the Church Missionary Society which specialised in locations outside Europe.
Norfolk Suit. During the Edwardian period, the Norfolk jacket remained fashionable for shooting and rugged outdoor pursuits. Made of sturdy tweed or similar fabric it featured paired box pleats over the chest and back, with a fabric belt. When worn with matching breeches (U.S. knickerbockers), it became the Norfolk suit, with knee-length stockings and low shoes suitable for bicycling or golf, or for hunting with sturdy boots or shoes with leather gaiters.
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The pictorial postcard: this was introduced into Britain in 1894 and became particularly popular with Edwardians, throughout the Empire, including India. In Britain, most were sold for a half-penny. With up to ten deliveries a day in urban areas, it was nearly as synchronous as the Twitter and Twitpic of today and often as relaxed and conversational in tone. As late as 1908 a priggish character in a story remarked: ‘I have always been brought up to think it rather rude to send postcards, unless they are picture ones for people to put in their albums’.
Frederick Scholte. Tailoring was softened in the early twentieth century by Savile Row’s Frederick Scholte especially when he developed the English drape. Scholte became the Duke of Windsor’s (King Edward VIII’s) tailor. The Duke commented ‘Scholte had rigid standards concerning the perfect balance of proportions between shoulders and waist in the cut of a coat to clothe the masculine torso.... These peculiar proportions were Scholte’s secret formula.’
‘Omnis intellectualis scientia’ etc. Aristotle. Metaphysics, v. 1. Translates roughly as ‘All intellectual knowledge, whether or not generated by him, is concerned with its causes and the principles behind its rules.’
Olympia Academy. Einstein met regularly to read and discuss books on science and philosophy with other friends in Bern, all yet unknown to the academic world. They called themselves the Olympia Academy, mocking the official bodies that dominated science.
Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Law of England. Holmes would have known that this famous law book was utilised by the American ‘traitor’ General Benedict Arnold during the War of Independence to communicate messages designed for British eyes.
Michele Besso. Until only a few years before his death, Einstein was - to put it mildly -frugal in acknowledging the work of others in the field, including contemporaries such as Jules Henri Poincaré. The one exception was life-long friend, engineer Michele Besso, valuable to Einstein as a sounding board. This earned Besso the famous acknowledgment in the special relativity paper of 1905. Nevertheless, Besso’s help in a technical problem concerning Einstein’s paper on the perihelion problem was never publicly acknowledged. Little did Einstein know at that point that his friend and admirer would preserve these earlier calculations for posterity.